PRSAs as transfers from Occupational Pensions

A Personal Retirement Savings Account (PRSA) can be used to accept the transfer from an Occupational Pension scheme once the Director or Employee has left service.

Up until the end of 2021, this option to use a PRSA was only available to people with less than 15 years of Pensionable Service. However, Finance Bill 2022 has outlined that PRSAs will be able to accept transfers from Schemes where the individual has more than 15 years service.

• This now provides those individuals with more than 15 years service with a lot of flexibility on when to take their Pension benefits

• A PRSA can be split into a number of smaller PRSAs, and each can be ‘retired’ separately to meet the retirement cashflow needs of the individual

Unlike a Company Pension Scheme, a PRSA can remain ‘pre-retirement’ up to age 75. Therefore, a PRSA can be a useful pension contract to house a transfer from a Company Pension Scheme, but only if the individual has less than 15 years of pensionable service.

Note that a PRSA is based on Contract as opposed to Trust, therefore there is no need for a Trustee.